Contributors

Syndicate

Thursday, November 29, 2018

NEW YORK (AP) — Major League Baseball is charging princely prices for its first games in Britain.

Premium seats at London’s Olympic Stadium will cost 385 pounds ($493) for the games between the New York Yankees and World Series champion Boston Red Sox on June 29 and 30. The top non-premium seats near the infield cost 320 pounds ($410).

Seats in the outfield corners go for 270 ($346) and 220 pounds ($282), according to a chart on Ticketmaster’s website. The ones behind the outfield fences go for 120 pounds ($154).

Ever get a feeling that MLB would mug us on the street if they thought we had a few bucks in our wallets?

Wednesday, September 05, 2018

And just last week someone was arguing with me that there’s no game theory in baseball!

What’s most frustrating about Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Eloy Jiménez not gracing stadiums, nightly broadcasts, highlight shows, sizzle reels, memes and every other square inch of baseball-related programming this September is the reason for their absence from the major leagues. It is the purest and most repugnant distillation of capitalism in baseball, and it feels silly to even type something this illogical: Guerrero and Jiménez have been so good, it pays to deny them the promotion they’ve earned.

Think about that. About doing great work – beyond-great work – and being penalized for it. It’s infuriating. It’s unfair. And it happens again and again and again in baseball, a sport that every year jerks around so many of its finest young talents for one reason only: control. Even though Guerrero is unquestionably one of the best players in the Toronto Blue Jays’ organization and Jiménez the same for the Chicago White Sox, the teams still needed to ask themselves a question: Is one month of them now worth one year of them in their primes?

Because that’s the calculus. And of course the answer was no. However liberating it may feel to flay the Blue Jays and White Sox for filching Guerrero and Jiménez’s well-earned spot on a major league roster, the manipulation of elite talents’ service time is clearly the right strategy for all teams, particularly rebuilding ones like the Blue Jays and White Sox. Admitting that is not siding with the teams; it’s a call for them to work with the MLB Players Association and figure out how not to punish teams for promoting good players.

Friday, July 27, 2018

In May, the Seattle Mariners proudly announced that they had agreed to terms on a new 25-year lease that would have kept them in Safeco Field through the 2049 season. The team had an ambition vision for the stadium’s place in Seattle.

“We want this ballpark to be our home for the next 100 years. Safeco Field should be to Seattle and to the Mariners what Wrigley Field is to Chicago and the Cubs and Fenway Park is to Boston and the Red Sox,” Mariners chairman and managing partner John Stanton said in a statement at the time.